Altice to halt spending spree

Altice CEO Dexter Goei has said the company will put on pause its spending spree, after agreeing to buy Cablevision Systems for $17.7 billion last week.

Goei told Bloomberg earlier this week that the company owes “it
to our investors, both on the debt and equity side, to pause on the pace of the
acquisitions, particularly on the sizable ones”.

The deal for Cablevision Systems forms part of Altice’s
ongoing expansion in the US cable market, which has also seen it acquire Suddenlink
Communications for $9.1 billion. The combination of Suddenlink and Cablevision
will create the fourth largest cable TV provider in the US, according to
Altice.

Earlier in September, Altice named former Alcatel-Lucent CEO Michel Combes as COO and chairman of the board of Numericable-SFR.